


Home is the Place (Where When You Have to Go There, They Have to Take You in)

by rosewiththorns



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Detroit Red Wings, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Kneeling, Kneeling verse, M/M, Non-Sexual Submission, Trades, mentoring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-17
Updated: 2015-01-17
Packaged: 2018-03-07 23:43:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3187694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewiththorns/pseuds/rosewiththorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After reading an article suggesting he be traded for Tyler Myers, Tomas needs Pavel to comfort and advise him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Home is the Place (Where When You Have to Go There, They Have to Take You in)

**Author's Note:**

> Although this story is set in a mild AU in which it’s normal for younger players to kneel for more veteran ones, Helene St. James did write an article on January 4th about how, to employ her phrasing, Tomas Tatar was emerging as a “very bankable asset” good for the trading block, so I used that concept as the basis for this fanfic.

“Home is the place where when you have to go there, they have to take you in.”- Robert Frost

Home is the Place (Where When You Have to Go There, They Have to Take You in)

“I’ve been reading the newspapers lately, Pav.” Tomas burrowed his cheek more deeply into the jeans covering Pavel’s knee, feeling ludicrously like an animal hibernating in a den for the winter, but he couldn’t prevent that humiliation, because the scratchy denim was soothing, concrete proof that he was still on the Red Wings—that he hadn’t been traded for that elusive right-shooting defenseman such as Tyler Myers that Ken Holland seemed to be chasing like a mythical unicorn. 

“Good for you.” Pavel tapped Tomas’ nose in a gesture he had learned to interpret as all the warning that he was going to get that he was about to be the target of a dazzling Datsyukian one-liner. “Didn’t know you could read, Tats.” 

“Just the sports page and the comics.” Tomas attempted his patented cheeky smile, but when it didn’t work for him, he pressed his lips together in a line as thin as pencil lead so that he wouldn’t surrender to shameful tears or hysterical laughter. “I read Helene wants to trade me for Tyler Myers of all the right-shot defenseman in the NHL. She wrote I was emerging as very bankable asset, which I guess is backhanded compliment since it means I’m doing well, but then she says I should be traded for Tyler Myers. I don’t want to get traded at all, but if it happens I want it to be for someone better than Myers, you know.” 

“So sports page was comics.” Pavel’s deft fingers combed Tomas’ hair away from his furrowed forehead. “Why I never read sports section. Might find articles about myself.” 

Narrowing his eyes to snake slits, Tomas squinted up at Pavel and tried to figure out if Pavel was making a joke, being serious, or using a quip as an oyster shell to pass along a genuine pearl of wisdom. With Pavel, who was the master of deadpan humor, it was always difficult to tell. “I already read this story. Can’t go back in time and un-read it even if I wish I could.” 

“No, Tats,” agreed Pavel in barely more than a murmur, continuing to brush Tomas’ hair away from his face. “Don’t think you can.” 

“It hurts like a slap on the face to be called trade bait.” Tomas’ fists balled around Pavel’s jeans, so neither of them had to see his hands trembling with a terrible blend of pain and fury. Of the entire Red Wings team, Pavel was the only one he could imagine revealing this inner turmoil, because, although Pavel was the quiet, humble type, he seemed to understand Tomas’ overwhelming need to be loud and cocky. And Pavel always had time for Tomas—whether it was showing him a new deke at practice, giving him a tip while they were sipping Gatorade on the bench between shifts during a game, or just sharing jokes. Pavel was Tomas’ mentor, and he didn’t want another one with a different NHL franchise in a strange city since nobody could beat the Magic Man at anything. 

Tomas could feel his throat tightening as if squeezed by a boa constrictor, and he found his tongue glued to the roof of his mouth, even though he wanted to continue to speak out with all the agony and rage boiling inside him. 

Acknowledging Tomas’ hurt and anger without seeking to diminish either emotion, Pavel patted Tomas’ shoulder, and that was enough for Tomas to regain control of his tongue enough to choke out, “It’s weird to feel so crappy over something some reporter lady said when I don’t really give a damn about what Babs shouts at me all the time. Well, I mean I care what he shouts ‘cause he makes sure of that, but I don’t care that he shouts at me if that makes sense.” 

“Sure.” Pavel nodded. “You know he just wants to help you be better hockey player.” 

“Yeah, he yells at me because he believes in me, not because he wants to get rid of me.” Chewing on his lower lip as if it were a wad of bubblegum, Tomas thought that the reason he could tolerate Coach Babcock yelling at him until he was blue in the face was that yelling wasn’t rejection. Yelling still meant caring, even if it was a burning caring. Walking away from someone forever without so much as a backward glance was an icy indifference like a father disowning a son or husband divorcing a wife. It was a permanent wound with no chance of healing. It was a trade. “The reporter lady wanted to get rid of me because I was playing good, which doesn’t even make sense. I should get to stay if I’m playing good.” 

“Don’t take this trade talk too hard, Tats.” Pavel clapped Tomas on the back. “They talked about trading Steve Yzerman, too.” 

“What?” spluttered Tomas, eyes on the verge of exploding from their sockets in astonishment, since Steve Yzerman was supposed to be the definition of a franchise player who couldn’t be traded. Then again, a snide voice pointed out inside Tomas’ head, even Wayne Gretzky was traded, and if the Great One was just another commodity on the hockey market, what hope did mere mortals have of not being trade bait? “No shit?” 

“Would this face lie to you?” Pavel assumed his most angelic expression which usually was intended to conceal borderline demonic intentions. 

“Maybe not.” Tomas snorted. “It would tell me sick jokes, though.” 

“I don’t joke about Steve Yzerman. He too serious.” Pavel’s face took on a stern, resolute cast that Tomas knew was supposed to be an imitation of Steve Yzerman’s perpetual grim, determined mask, and Tomas, although he had never met the man who in Detroit would forever be referred to as The Captain (relegating all future captains to a less iconic, lower-case status), laughed anyway. After all, he felt as if he did know Steve Yzerman, because the strong presence of The Captain lingered in the locker room in Hank and Pav. 

“But he not the only one they talk about trading,” Pavel went on once Tomas had stopped laughing. “They also want to trade me for Scott Gomez.” 

Tomas would have scoffed a dismissal of this crazy notion, and if he didn’t see enough of a ghost of pain in Pavel’s eyes to realize that he was hearing the truth. 

“Scott fucking Gomez?” echoed Tomas, hoping that he had heard wrong or possibly was thinking of the wrong Scott Gomez. “The guy who signed a massive contract but went a whole year without potting a goal?” 

“That hadn’t happened to him yet.” Pavel shrugged. “He known as good playoff performer, and I called playoff dud who just like to dangle-dangle.” 

“Oh.” Tomas’ mind felt blown out of this world—possibly into an alternate universe—trying to envision any time that Pavel could be regarded as the equal nonetheless the inferior to Scott Gomez of the multi-million contract and zero production. “Well, the Devils definitely wouldn’t be able to get you for Scott Gomez now if it makes you feel any better, Pav.” 

“Thank you.” Pavel’s mouth quirked wryly as he swatted at Tomas’ elbow. “But you missing point. Point is doesn’t matter what people say about you. You need learn that people can talk about you all the time, and nothing does it actually have to do with you.” 

This final remark sounded like a typical deep Datsyuk comment that had been uttered in garbled English and then run through a syntax scrambler for further confusion, but Tomas craved some more practical advice, so he pressed, “That’s wonderfully philosophical and crap, but what the hell happens if I’m traded?” 

“You make new friends, but not lose your old ones.” Pavel massaged the knots of tension coiled in Tomas’ neck. “It twenty-first century, not Dark Ages, Tats, so we use calling and texting and Skype to keep in touch. We still cheer for you except when you play against the Red Wings, and you stay part of Red Wings family even if you wear different sweater.” 

Tomas could feel the fist around his heart starting to unclench, but he couldn’t stop himself from declaring, as he gazed up at Pavel with all the adulation he felt for this magician who could bring crowds to his feet but never acted as if he was in any way special or better than anyone else, “I want to stay in Detroit, though, so I can be like you one day.” 

“You can’t be like me, because you amazing little sniper, and I just regular hockey player.” As self-depracating in his humor as ever, Pavel chuckled. “I stupid and never think shoot-first, but you smart and always think shoot-first.”


End file.
